Metro News & Reviews

Board of Directors to take up a variety of issues Thursday

The agency’s 13-member Board of Directors meets on Thursday morning to discuss and vote on a variety of issues. They’re the ultimate deciders for Metro, so here’s a roundup of some of the bigger items on the table/agenda:

•Bus service changes and cuts (item 24) — The cuts amount to about 3.6 percent of Metro’s bus service, including the elimination of five Rapid lines. I posted about this yesterday; here’s the full staff report with the details.

•Contract for NextBus real-time arrival information (item 19) — The $1.6-million contract with the firm NextBus is to develop a system that would allow web users to see what time the next bus is showing up, something which is becoming more common in other cities. Here’s the staff report and here’s a recent post about it.

•Report on 30/10 project schedule (item 31) — The report from Metro staff spells out projected opening dates for the 12 Measure R projects that the agency wants to accelerate using federal loans and financing. This report has the Westside Subway Extension opening to Westwood in fiscal year 2020 and the Regional Connector opening in 2019. Staff report.

•Bond sales for Measure R projects (item 28) — The proposal would allow the sale of up to $825 million in bonds to help build Measure R projects, acknowledging that the bonds could create debt that would have to be paid off. Staff report.

•Policy on conduct at Metro public meetings (item 6) — The policy updates existing conduct rules. One change could bar someone tossed from a meeting from addressing the Board of Directors for up to 90 days. Staff report.

•Universal City-subway station pedestrian bridge (item 3) — To go forward with preliminary engineering on a pedestrian bridge over Lankershim Boulevard. An underpass was originally proposed in the mid-1990s, now it’s a bridge. Staff report with renderings.

•Passenger information system for Blue and Green lines (item 30) — The proposal would add a system that would improve the public address systems at stations and also be capable of displaying public service announcements and train arrival information such as found on the Red and Purple line subway. Staff report.

Any idea if this information would be freely available as a database, so developers could use it to make smartphone apps or different websites? For example, could Google give you directions based on actual live bus data, rather than the schedule? Could I make a Metro “next bus” iPhone app?

This could be amazingly helpful for recreational and shopping trips, and tourists, as well as current commuters.

“The contracted service also provides the flexibility to push the data distribution to
third party developers (by a web service or API) such as mobile application developers – which increases MTA’s ability to more readily adapt and change as new technology improvements come to market.”

I’m not sure if Google has ever implemented live transit data, but I know some 3rd party developers have created such “mashups”. We’ll be sure to have more info if the Board approves the contract and work on the system begins.